Volume builder - higher garage

Chloejade87 · Jun 29, 2019 1:09 pm

Hi all,
Does anyone have any experience building with a volume builder like PD or Henley and adjusting the internal ceiling heigh of the garage to over 3.5 meters. Hubby wants to fit a small hoist in a three car garage to build his car. I believe we will also need concrete reinforcement if we have a hoist.

l_vanslyke · Jul 02, 2019 9:26 am

Hi,

From my experience as a building designer; most high volume builders will not want to vary too much from their standard plans or will charge you an arm and a leg in the hopes to defer your decision.

Increasing the height to 3.5m on a single story home will greatly affect the roof or slab design, not so much on a 2 storey design (if there is nothing planned above the garage). The engineer will also need to account for point loads in the slab design so it is important they know the type of hoist and where it will be located.

It's best to ask a few builders if they're willing to do this and at what cost (before you pay any money).

Hope this helps!

Chloejade87 · Jul 02, 2019 1:20 pm

Thanks, that is very helpful! Looking at double with a gap above the garage. Will direct the question to Henley. Appreciate your help!!

l_vanslyke · Jul 02, 2019 1:58 pm

No worries at all, best of luck with it!

Forg · Jul 02, 2019 2:07 pm

If you can swing 3.8m without other inconvenience, I would do that … you'll fit 90% of available hoists in there. But read on …

Which style of hoist to go for is another question, the 4-post style has drive-on ramps that get in the way when you're working under the car, plus you need extra attachments to lift the car off it's wheels - however, because there are 4 rather than two posts AND all the forces exert straight down, you're not really putting any more pressure on the concrete than the tyres do. These don't need as high a ceiling (but too low a ceiling will cause husband stoopage - do you want stoopage?!).

The 2-post hoists come in what I'd call 2 main varieties, the "clear floor" style joins at the top and leaves you with no hump on the ground, and are a bit taller than the traditional style with the hump in the floor. You might convince your builder to rebate a trench in the floor to fit a traditional-style 2-post, and it won't need such tall posts (and the ceiling can be lower). However, all 2-post styles will exert some twisting motion on the concrete and you definitely need to get the hoist's installed location designed so that the engineer can give you the required reinforcement.

Our garage has a ~3.5m ceiling purely due to the lay-of-the-land; our block slopes about a total of a metre across the ~17m frontage, so our garage floor ended-up about 600mm below the rest of the ground floor.

Don't forget the room around the hoist, too. You really want at least 6m internal depth for a real car (my shed is ~5.5m internally & it's a little tight with my 70's family-sedan car in it), and most hoists will need at least 3.5m width. You can't realistically fit a fixed hoist into one side of a 2-car garage, you need at least a 2.5 (which means a normal double-door won't work as you can't line-up the car to go perpendicularly into the hoist).

One other thing - if you raise the ceiling you'll get more "house" (brickwork/render/whatever) about a standard-height garage door. I'd recommend getting the tallest door you can install. I had a roll-a-door fitted as the roll is more out of the way than the panel-lift would be when open.